The Mysteries Of The City
by Red-Cherry-Flowers
Summary: A year has past since Alis failed her test to prove herself and now a year on she still is living in the dangerous city. Will she meet Joel's gang again? Will it end in tragedy or will Alis find what she has been waiting for?


**Hey, first fic for the category, yay! Well I hope you all like this one! It set when Alis and Joel's gang go out and Alis must "prove" herself and fails, but in my version Edge never comes to get her. I also must say, I love the book, I thought it was great and I reckon Alis is going to be one female character that I will remember for ever. Well, enjoy!**

"_Useless Bitch!" _

The phrase was repeated over and over again in her mind as if she were under a spell of magical stillness. She didn't see or notice time pass; she couldn't feel the soft icy night wind on her face or the clutching of the knife in her hand, nor the rotting smell of the dirty cobbled path under the worn down soles of her boots.

Her intended victim still lay on the floor, whispering under his breath, his face red as a tomato, his breath was shallow but he nether said nor looked at Alis, it was as if she were not even there.

After what felt like a lifetime, maybe even two, Alis felt a small tingling in her hand that clutched tightly around the knife and after a moment Alis felt her fingers unclasp around the object and as if in slow motion she watched the knife fall from her hand, fall towards the ground and watched as it cluttered against the dirty street.

But she neither moved nor said a word as if she had forgotten how to move, as if she limbs would not understand the confusing and irrational thinking of her mind…

_**-- 1 years later --**_

Understanding time was like understanding the sun and moon. It continuously changes; it never stops, just as the sun and moon never stop their turns in watching over the Earth and evidently causing humans to call the sun's watch _day_, and the moon's watch _night_. As a person sleeps night can come and go as fast as if it were a single second in time while day can be so slow it can feel like a lifetime until the horizon were to begin to turn a golden orange rays as the sun says it's goodbye. Time is like this too; sometimes it is slow while sometimes fast.

Alis never thought of time in numerals, always in seasons. She had lost real count of how many winters and summers she had seen now while she still remained in the city, how many autumns and springs had come and gone without her real attention to them.

She had wanted to escape from a marriage to an old man; that she had, she had prevailed in her mission to find her brother, only to find the young man that was not at all like the Joel that she remembered and longed for while in the Communities. She had gained nothing from leaving her mother and father and she wondered if that was how Joel had once seen things when he had experienced the city after some time.

She was a prisoner in her own plan; as if the Maker were sitting up in heaven laughing at her, punishing her for dishonoring her mother and father by running away. Alis was sometimes angry at the Maker for not being able to help her, but then again, every time Alis tried to pray, when she tried to speak to the Maker, call for help, she felt like she were pray to thin air, as if she were asking hope from an illusion that had never existed in the first place.

She sometimes wondered of Luke, but she did not have the strength, nor the will to be able to go back or see him again. What would he think of her now? She was a dirty city girl, roaming the streets, working the a local pub as a barmaid, allowing men to loot and call out to her, simply because that was what was expected of her now to be able to earn money, but she would never let them touch her.

She felt like the Maker had put a curse to her, she wanted to leave this forsaken place called 'city' yet, something in her was holding her back, as if she were waiting for something, something that would soon come, as if it were saying, _'Tomorrow, tomorrow you will see.'_ But see what, she did not know…

It had been two years since she had departed from her brother and his gang; but that night was as clear to her as if she witnessed it every day, she could still smell the fear and terror from the man, still taste the bitter taste in her mouth when she realized the purpose of the knife. She could still see Weasel's face and hear his angry snarl in her mind's eye and ears; that night after what felt like hours (or it could have only been minutes in reality, she simply did not know) she had turned and began to run with such speed she did not even know she possessed. She ran as if the devil himself was after her…

But Alis had not seen any of them since; Joel, Edge, Weasel, Shadow, Dancer, Fleet or Mute, and for that she was very glad. So from the age of still fifteen she had taken a position at a small pub on the outskirts of the city, and for two years she remained there, working and keeping mostly to herself, trying to earn enough money for a trip home but the pay was bad, sometimes she'd go weeks without payment simply because the owners could not afford to pay. But she stayed because it was one of the safest places in the city for her at the moment and she was glad of it.

Now at sixteen, only a few months away from seventeen, she felt like she had lived a lifetime, in the last small year and a half she had experience more in life then she had in the fourteen years previously.

But the story is not over just yet; for it has hardly even begun for Alis, for as so many would say, no matter how long the moon watches the night, the sun will always reappear and along with the sun, it will bring warmth and sunshine more bright then any moon or stars that light the night skies.

But yet funny enough this story begins, not with the sun and sunshine of a new morning, but in an autumn night…

"Alis!" cried a middle-aged woman from across the pub, "would you get off your hind and put some drink out! I'm not paying you to spend your time reading all night!"

Alis looked up from a book that she had found abandoned in one of the upstairs lodgings in the small pub. She had been curious about it and had opened it and begun to read and was soon enticed with the pages and words that she had been unable to stop. But now she hesitantly closed the book and pushed it into a small corner where she knew nobody would bother to look and called over to Mrs. Coutcher, "Right you are madam!"

She hurried to the bar and Mr. Coutcher smiled over at her, "Now, now, dear, you must do the work if you want the pay."

Alis said nothing, she had indeed always enjoyed Mr. Coutcher's company compared to his wife's but she knew it was best if she didn't say anything in response and she should just hold her tongue like a good little Community girl that was lost in the storm somewhere inside her.

She picked up a tray of drinks from the bar table and turned to a group of men of five sitting at one of the tables in the small crowded pub. Alis saw they were dressed in sailor uniforms, mostly from the sea she suspected. She approached them and they all grinned at her and one called as she placed the drinks onto the table, "Never mind the bloody drinks Henry, we got ourselves something a little more special!"

Ignoring the men Alis turned trying her best to master her facial emotions of disgust and annoyance and began to walk back towards the bar and just as she was about to reach it someone appeared out of nowhere and she walked straight into them with a little more force then she had intended and she fell back, the empty tray fall from her hands as she used them to break her fall.

Looking up slightly dazed at the force of collision, she expected to see some drunk or perhaps even worse, an angry person that she might owe something to. But instead to her surprise she saw a boy no older then herself standing above her, she did not know him but something about his beautiful heart-shaped face sent a crack of fear through her body. She knew that face, but she could not recognize from where.

The boy wore mismatched clothing of bright colours, but the clothing was dirty and Alis had been in the city and on the streets enough in the past year or so to know the boy was street-wise, his frame was thin as if she had not eaten in days, his dark hair was cropped short but seemed unevenly messy as he grinned at her.

"Sorry miss!" he said, "I didn't see you!"

Alis stared up at him, something about him was so familiar yet frightening at the same time so she didn't reply, and the boy's grin faltered and he looked at her more closely as if studying her for something before his eyes grew wide with recognition.

Alis frowned, he looked so familiar, and from the recognition on his face he seemed to know her. But she could not place him!

He suddenly smirked at her and she saw something register in the boy's bright eyes as he leaned down offering her his hand saying, "Dance, Alis?"

A sudden flash back prevailed in Alis' mind; _she was trapped in an alleyway, Edge and Weasel blocking her exists and Dancer performing a small dance and then stared at her for a moment, the same eyes and the same beautiful face as were before her, before saying innocently, "Dance?"_

Alis gasped in shock of the moment and situation and she scrambled back away from Dancer who looked slightly confused by her reaction and properly a little offended.

"Alis?"

"Get away from me!"

"Alis it's me-"

"I _know_! Get _away_ from me!"

Dancer stood up to his full height and look down at her in even more confusion as she stumbled to her feet but she never took her eyes of Dancer. She stood now and saw he was a little taller then she but he had not changed much. How could she have not known him when she first laid eyes on him?! What was he going _here_? Surely it was nothing to do with her!

Alis took a step back, feeling once again the fear crack in her heart as Dancer watched her more careful this time.

"What's the matter?" he asked her. She noted how his speech was different then last time they had met, he spoke more formally, more like the others, rather then in his short odd way.

Alis felt her breathing double and her chest rose and fall in a fast and frantic manner and she tried to scream for help or snarl at him to get out and never come here again, but she became aware that no breath was coming to her lungs yet her breathing was deeper and faster. It was as if her lungs were not accepting the air that she was gasping in; as if she were drowning.

She watched as Dancer frowned a little and his expression turn to nervous worry, "You alright, Alis?"

Her vision was swirling and the yellow lighting in the pub and the loud voices around her seemed to mix into one crazy collision and she suddenly felt like she was falling through air very fast while at the same time everything around her was engulfed in darkness and the last thing she heard was the distant call of her name.

**First chapter done! I know it's a little short but I tend to do that with my introductions of stories. Well I hope some will review to give me some feedback! **


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